Sydney FC will head south full of confidence after last weekend’s 7-1 win when they face Melbourne Victory this afternoon to kick off an A-League Australia Day triple-header. We’ll have minute-by-minute updates from 5.30pm AEDT.

The sleeping giant, it seems, has finally awoken.

An unrelenting burst of five goals in 28 minutes, which saw Alessandro Del Piero net his first A-League hattrick, kickstarted Sydney FC’s stop-start season, and they went on to romp to a 7-1 victory in front of their home fans.

With new signing Joel Griffiths and Jason Culina also finding themselves on the scoresheet, the rout of Wellington was indicative of a side who have the necessary threats to challenge any A-League outfit on their day.

They’ll get a good measure of exactly how they are travelling this afternoon when they face a Melbourne Victory side sitting comfortably in third place.

Ange Postecoglou’s side have continued to build through the season, and a win over Sydney this afternoon would lift them above Adelaide into third position and only five points behind A-League leaders Central Coast.

After commanding performances last weekend, both Melbourne and Sydney will name virtually unchanged lineups and with no real injuries to speak of, we should be treated to a clash between two full-strength, in-form sides here.

Both sides possess serious attacking weapons – Rojas, Flores and Thompson for the home side and Del Piero, Griffiths and Culina for the Sky Blues – but the key to this one could be how the two sides’ defences stand up.

Sydney FC hold the worst defensive record in the A-League, and while Melbourne Victory’s back four has improved, they’ve also leaked 24 goals in 17 matches.

Sydney will come into this one expecting another strong performance after last week and if Tiago and Adam Griffiths can stand up at the back, they could get another result here.

We were really poor, MV definitely deserved the win- it was a frustrating game all-round. Chris Beath didn’t have a good game; his calls were inconsistent at times and Diogo Ferreira could’ve been sent off twice before Fabio was red-carded. Really disappointing game from an SFC perspective.

That being said, the idea of an ‘Australia Day Big Blue’ is fantastic, the FFA should work to ensure it remains a tradition. It was my first time at AAMI Park, Melbourne is lucky, it’s a fantastic stadium.

OK they deserved the win, but it’s how the win was achieved that I am referring to and it wasn’t done by totally out classing SFC as the one-eyed MV supporter has suggested.. When Emerton was forced from the field some confidence in the team immediately evaporated—reorganisation had to take place—totally changed the dynamics of SFC game plan..

Rojas’s goals were severe deflections to wrong foot Janjetovic who otherwise had them covered. As you say “Chris Beath didn’t have a good game; his calls were inconsistent at times and Diogo Ferreira could’ve been sent off” Therefore, I maintain we were unlucky not to come home with a draw.. I didn’t think we were good enough to win, but very unlucky to have lost because of those circumstances I have outlined. I’m confident when we meet again in the playoffs we can overcome them next time..

One or two of those goals were deemed as own goals and the ball played the man (both times), the players involved never played at the ball so we will never really know. None of the commentators have said there was any evidence that they should have been pens if the keeper either saved the shorts or the shots did not eventually end up in the back of the net. Therefore, we will never know. I don’t believe the players ever tried to deliberately to stop the balls with their arms, but the ball struck them accidentally—so no pen in my view..

“Harry got a Red Card at WC2010 (against GHA) when a ball, which was heading towards goal, hit his upper arm.”

Harry, leaned towards the ball deliberately with arm and was last man on the line.. I seem to remember some time you said it was not a pen..

“Heck, SydneyFC could have ended with 7 men on the pitch” Rubbish, you guys were no angels either.. How many times did ADP get chopped? I lost count

SFC’s inconsistency still remains an issue for Farina––notwithstanding, the lack of concentration when playing away from home, especially in front of such a venomous audience at AAMI stadium that we witnessed last night. Farina failed on this occasion to pump up the team when they ran out onto the pitch. Because it took an Emerton injury, two unlucky deflected (or own goals), and poor referring, to finally stir up the boys in Sky Blue to start playing football in the last 30 mins of the game…

I wrote in another article if we were to come away with a point (and it should’ve been a 1-1 result) we could have held our heads high. However, the mishaps that occurred yesterday could not have been any more unlucky for those who follow the Sky Blues. So therefore, with better luck next time, we still have plenty of time to make the six––we can keep improving. All we need to do is keep up the pressure on those teams around us with still nine games to go.

There is still plenty on light at end of the tunnel I can see to come out of this and achieve a berth place in the playoffs and our goal, the Championship… C’mon the Sky Blues, the premier club of Sydney (If not Australia)… Thank God Frank Lowy saw fit to leave my club––he would have axed ADP as he did Yorke after only one season… Looks like ADP is staying on…

That was the best performance from MVFC this year. Of course, we had the usual lapse to concede a goal, but that was close to a 9/10 performance.

Diogo was the only player, who struggled – but, the lad never dropped his head & nearly set up a goal with a wonderful chip cross right at the end.

Sydney actually played better after the 1st red card. ADP was anonymous but, the little he did, he just oozes class. His ability to turn & control the ball is the best I’ve ever seen live in a stadium .. and, I’ve seen Ronaldinho, Ronaldo (Brasilien version), Kaka live in the stadium.

Sydney definitely came to play today, but they have been slowly and precisely overpowered over 90 miunutes, and Melbourne Victory could really have run out 4-1 or 5-1 winners. Rojas was the chief destroyer, but good performances from Broxham, Thompson and the Melbourne Victory back four allowed Ange Postecoglou’s side what ended up a comfortable win.

They’ll move to second after that performance on 33 points, and with nine rounds remaining look certainties to be contesting deep into the A-League finals.

That will be it from AAMI Park tonight, thanks for reading along. Enjoy what looks to be a bumper night of A-League action.

Stadium members may not have been able to make the game, and normal members may not have been able to make the game? Whatever the case, it was still a sell out with all seats sold, just not all seats filled!

its disappointing that MV members cant attend against sydney and to see AdP. we all know you can’t make every game, i missed a Brisbane game well because i was overseas.but 3000 members couldn’t make it out of 18000? about 17%?
bit tired of reading the fan base/so many people were going but 1 in 6 members couldn’t make it to the game.
good for MV to sell the seats but non attendance is a curiousity.

It has been stated before that due to ground configuration eg tarping off seats between active/ non active supporters, away supporters etc that for Football games the maximum capacity is around 28,600 so there were about 1,800 non attendees including members and corporate.
Anyway as one of the attendees l can vouch for a sell out crowd (all ticket booths were closed before the game) and a fabulous and unique atmosphere unsurpassed in Oz sport. SFC fans made great noise also and so credit to them.
Looking forward to the Derby this week and maybe 42,000 plus at Etihad.
There is nothing like the MV juggernaut as it gathers momentum during the season.

Jeez. Del Piero completes Beath’s night of nights with a yellow card of his own. To be fair, most of the cards have been warranted but this one was a joke. Slight bit of contact as he competed for the ball off a throw-in. Poor decision.